Gaming PC whats more important?
- Thread starter Dendio
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It's all equal, because you won't get far in one aspect unless you have a minimum in another. It's like a triangle, if you make one side too large, another will shrink. But if you are lookin to upgrade, I'd go for the RAM, as it's like candy, you can't have enough. If it's for an old computer, get the RAM (barring that it's DDR2, wait for PC to slowly die, then use memory for new amazing computer, preferably liquid cooled.
Graphics Card/ GPU is actually more important in terms of running games smoothly, then probably next would be RAM as it's the amount of memory the computer can draw from and run processes from. Next would be the processor as it's the speed and efficiency you can run programs and applications at without your computer having a whinge and not responding or freezing on you.
Ultimately though, you should get a decent unit of all of those if you want to be a pc gamer.
Ultimately though, you should get a decent unit of all of those if you want to be a pc gamer.
Im actually considering a new desktop and was looking for which part I should put my money into first. Im actually surprised. For whatever reason I thought that the cpu was the most important piece and ram least important. Im kind of new at understanding what makes pcs workDaedalus1942 said:
:S
well my computer runs xp, has 3.5 gbs of ram, a 2.4 GHz dual core processor, an Nvidia 250 Gts graphics card, and I can run most games at max Graphics and aLMOST MAX aa (Dragon Age, Bioshock II, L4d2, Mass Effect 2, Crysis I can run on High.Dendio said:
My computer's outdated but I built it myself so it will be at least 3 more years before I'll need to upgrade again.
Off Topic:If you can run Crysis on high graphics, you have a very good PC.Daedalus1942 said:
OT: All of those are important factors, although the Graphic Card in my opinion is the top priority, then Random-Access-Memory(RAM), then the Core.
If you want a good gaming experience, just get a PC with all of those factors.
You have them in the right order in the OP. The CPU is the core of your computer, it calculates all the physics, load times, and scripts to make your game run smoothly. The GPU is there to make the graphics move smoothly. The RAM just makes everything more efficient.
Check System Requirements lab <link=http://cyri.systemrequirementslab.com/CYRI/intro.aspx>here.Dendio said:
End of story.
Actually, in a 32-bit system, you can only have 3.5 gigabytes.Aric Rainwater said:
So get Windows 7 while you're out there.
It's above average, not massively high end. I can run it on high graphics, not very high or max (those are greyed out for me).Ze_Reaper_Of_Zeath said:
Video Card.
Everything else comes in just about any computer you can get but the video card takes some dough that you actually notice spending and you appreciate it so much when it's good but when it's bad... LAG!
Seriously, who DOESN'T have at least4 gigs of ram and a core 2 at 2.1 Ghz or better? TI's the video card that separates the boys from the men(computers)
Everything else comes in just about any computer you can get but the video card takes some dough that you actually notice spending and you appreciate it so much when it's good but when it's bad... LAG!
Seriously, who DOESN'T have at least4 gigs of ram and a core 2 at 2.1 Ghz or better? TI's the video card that separates the boys from the men(computers)
As long as your other parts don't cause a bottleneck then gpu is the most important. Having a good cpu is important for some games like the new battlefield and you need RAM for pretty much anything. Make sure you have at least 4gigs of RAM. Some people will say to get more. Don't listen to these people.
Well the problem with upgrading a CPU is that you will most likely also have to upgrade your Mobo. GPU is probably the obvious choice but I would say CPU is almost as important. As long as you have 2+ gigs of ram you should be fine. But I would not buy cheap ram if you are going to get new ram.
Pretty much this. If you neglect any one of the three you're not going to get the best performance.Aric Rainwater said:
The answer is of course a good balance of them all, but really, it depends:Dendio said:
Heavy general use:
if you browser the web a lot and like to run loads of programs at once like simultaneously have firefox open with 12 tabs + several videos, a video in background, word and excel documents, iTunes, and all that jazz... then having loads of Ram is very important. See because even if at any one time you are only using one program (low CPU load) you still have a lot of things in the system memory.
If you don't have enough ram then your computer will get slooooooow and it will stutter and whir like crazy as you switch from application to application as it can't keep all the app data on the RAM at once it goes to the page-file on the hard disk which it is slow to access.
Long term upgradable:
Buying a PC with a powerful CPU is very important as if you haven't got the right socket to use a more powerful CPU then you have no choice but to get a new motherboard where you pretty much have to start over. The CPU is the fundamental component of general computing and especially for gaming though it doesn't have to be super powerful, it must be capable.
You can slot in a new graphics card but without a decent CPU that will be a major bottleneck, dual-core is a MUST for gaming now and it is becoming increasingly apparent how important quad cores are. Also, with many games with poor graphics-cards you can get by by lowering the settings, but that won't help you if yoru CPU is not up to snuff.
Bottom line:
if you want to play games at better settings than Xbox 360 then a good graphics card is a must, it has to be a fairly recent one to support at least DirectX 10 and Pixel Shader 3.0 standards.
The thing is, a graphics card is easily to add in last but without careful consideration it can get hugely expensive.
Having a good graphics card can mean the difference between good experience and GREAT gameplay.
I'm the tech support for my extended family and I have figured out why so many people have problems with "aww my computer is so slow now" because they got the computer in 2007 or something when RAM was expensive so thought they could settle for only 1GB or so.Plurralbles said:
But in that time not only has RAM gotten cheaper but programs have gotten far greedier and loads of them want to be on all the time. Here is what a typical non-gaming computer may have to run all at the same time:
-Spotify (or equivalent music streaming program)
-messenger
-increasingly active anti-virus
-BBC iPlayer or similar content player
-Messenger programs
-itunes for music/phone updating
-several browsers with multiple tabs and video streaming/buffering
-word documents
-VLC videos
-Torrenting (of all those WoW patches *wink*)
-system tray full of crap-ware updating, waiting to update, monitoring printers, etc
At any one time the CPU load may be small but that will cripple 1Gig of memory, especially on Vista which is a bit of a memory hog. But I'm telling you, if you give vista the memory it craves then it runs like a dream, no more page-file dumps.
One thing I hear that is even better than running 4GB of RAM is running your OS and frequent documents/programs of a Solid State Drive, I've heard people say they can't even bear using a computer that runs of a standard HDD any-more, as literally everything is open almost as soon as you need it. Completely gone are the "click, wait... then it opens" it's just like flicking through a book.
So the first thing I ask when people say their computer is so slow now is "how much RAM" and if they say "what's RAM" I can guess probably as low as 1GB or even 512MB.
For gaming, go for broke on the video card. CPU and RAM can certainly create performance bottlenecks, but it's entirely possible to spend $100 each on a CPU and RAM and still have in-game performance limited by a $300 video card, especially on the newest games.
Memory: Adding memory (either to main system RAM or by buying a higher-memory GPU) will make a night-and-day difference in performance if you don't have enough already. Because loading data into memory, especially from mechanical hard drives, is one of the slowest tasks your computer performs, having insufficient RAM to run your programs will dramatically reduce performance. However, once you have enough memory to run all of your programs, additional memory will add no performance whatsoever. Try to determine about how much memory you'll need to run games alongside the apps you keep open all the time (OS/music/IM/email etc.) and add a little extra to give you a bit of wiggle room. Most people will do fine with 4 gigs on 64-bit Vista/7. You should also ensure that you run memory in two channels (an even number of DIMMs) to get the best performance.
CPU: Except for a handful of games, virtually any current-generation CPU (AMD Athlon II/Phenom II or Intel Core i3/i5/i7) CPU is plenty fast. A few games, especially those ported from the 360, benefit from a third CPU core (AMD makes triple core processors, Intel jumps from two to four). Beyond the $200 range (AMD Phenom 965, Intel i5 750), games hardly benefit from spending more on a CPU.
Memory: Adding memory (either to main system RAM or by buying a higher-memory GPU) will make a night-and-day difference in performance if you don't have enough already. Because loading data into memory, especially from mechanical hard drives, is one of the slowest tasks your computer performs, having insufficient RAM to run your programs will dramatically reduce performance. However, once you have enough memory to run all of your programs, additional memory will add no performance whatsoever. Try to determine about how much memory you'll need to run games alongside the apps you keep open all the time (OS/music/IM/email etc.) and add a little extra to give you a bit of wiggle room. Most people will do fine with 4 gigs on 64-bit Vista/7. You should also ensure that you run memory in two channels (an even number of DIMMs) to get the best performance.
CPU: Except for a handful of games, virtually any current-generation CPU (AMD Athlon II/Phenom II or Intel Core i3/i5/i7) CPU is plenty fast. A few games, especially those ported from the 360, benefit from a third CPU core (AMD makes triple core processors, Intel jumps from two to four). Beyond the $200 range (AMD Phenom 965, Intel i5 750), games hardly benefit from spending more on a CPU.